


A Captain Walks Into A Bar  (1/2)

by My_Young_Friend



Category: Sharpe, Star Trek (2009)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-24
Updated: 2009-11-24
Packaged: 2017-10-03 16:24:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,713
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/My_Young_Friend/pseuds/My_Young_Friend
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What happens when Captain Kirk meets a certain Major Sharpe in a bar?</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Captain Walks Into A Bar  (1/2)

Title: A Captain Walks Into A Bar  (1/2)  
Pairing: Kirk/Sharpe, implied Sharpe/Harper  
Rating: PG-13 (language)  
Summary: What happens when Captain Kirk meets a certain Major Sharpe in a bar?  
Notes/Warning: Crossover with Sharpe. Warnings language and spoilers for Star Trek XI. Beta'd and whipped into shape by the font of knowledge that is [](http://airspaniel.livejournal.com/profile)[**airspaniel**](http://airspaniel.livejournal.com/) .

 

Captain's log, stardate 1632.8. The Enterprise is in orbit around an M-class planet in the Kanin System. Readings indicate the presence of a civilization strangely analogous to that of early Nineteenth-century Earth, and a team is being sent to further investigate. Myself, Doctor McCoy and anthropologist Lieutenant Chauvin, have been outfitted in an approximation of the native clothing, and have been briefed by Lieutenant Commander Spock on what sensors have revealed about the currency, conventions and current events. The local dialect is compatible with Federation Standard, so miscommunication should be easy to avoid. We are to beam down to a central location and begin our investigation.

The door to the building swung open and Kirk quickly strode inside, shaking the rain from his coat. A quick glance told him that not only had he successfully found a bar, but that there were two rather delightful waitresses making the rounds, a bartender and a couple of men hunched over the bar itself. He took a seat next to one, who glared at him and moved to a table at the edge of the room. The other watched this, laughed and turned back to his drink.

Kirk observed the man at the bar, noted what appeared to be small crown on his jacket. From its location he assumed it was an indication of rank, although which rank was impossible to tell. If it had been anything like historical US insignia, Kirk would have put him as a Lieutenant Colonel. Given the surroundings, Kirk assumed he was, at best, a Sergeant-Major.

"And I thought I only had that effect on women." Kirk joked. The man to his left gave a non-committal grunt. Kirk shifted over a seat and extended a hand.

"Captain James T Kirk." The man ignored his hand and Kirk withdrew it.

"You can stop throwing your title around, Captain." The man's voice carried a slight hint of a sneer, but was mainly disinterested. "Doesn't count for anything here. Bloody Americans, all obsessed with ranks."

"Speaking of which, who'd you steal that insignia from?" Kirk shot back. It wasn't so much a calculated risk as annoyance at the dismissive tone of the stranger. The man turned to face him, and Kirk tensed, ready for whatever was about to be thrown at him.

"You're a cheeky bugger, aren't you?" The man's tone was surprised but amused. A faint smile crossed his lips, but looked more threatening than comforting. "Best be warned then; I'm Major Richard Sharpe."

"And?" Kirk relaxed and gestured for him to continue.

"That's your warning." Sharpe nodded and turned to his drink again.

"Riight." Kirk could feel an added tension in the air. He smiled at how familiar it was, bringing back memories of way too many bar-fights.

"Captain, was it?" Sharpe queried, looking straight ahead at the barrels behind the bar.

"Yup," Kirk replied.

"You must be lost then," Sharpe continued. "Officers' do is on the other side of town at the mansion." Kirk noted how Sharpe almost spat the word officer, as though the taste of it was bitter in his mouth. It was obvious Major Sharpe didn't care much for military hierarchy. Kirk could sympathise with that, and was curious to find out how a man with such disdain for officers had ever managed to become one.

"Well I don't tend to play well with others." Kirk responded. Sharpe snorted at the comment. "But this place seemed nice enough for a quiet drink."

"Best be getting one, then."

Kirk looked away from Sharpe to see the bartender standing in front of him, practically looming. Typical dive-bar bartender, thought Kirk. He smiled broadly to the impassive face in front of him.

"Hi, yeah I'll have one of those," he said, gesturing to Sharpe's drink.

"A pint?" The bartender's tone was patronising, and Kirk again felt irritated. Apparently Americans weren't much liked around here.

"Yeah," Kirk replied sternly, "a pint."

The bartender turned and grabbed a jug from behind him and filled it with beer. He put it down haphazardly, spilling some on the bar in front of Kirk. Kirk smiled at him sarcastically and took a swig. He barely kept from spitting it out again as the lukewarm liquid swilled around his mouth. Finally swallowing, he couldn't help but complain.

"God, it's warm!"

Sharpe shot a look at him "Course it's bloody warm, it's the middle of summer!"

"Can't you cool it?" Kirk said, without thinking.

"Cool it? Where d'you think you are, bloody Pyrenees? This is a pub, not some manor house with a cool room." Sharpe looked disgusted. "You'll be wanting champagne next, you ponce."

Kirk realised he'd somehow made a mistake, one that went far further than just wanting a cold beer somewhere where it wasn't possible to get one. He rolled his eyes and tried to reassert himself.

"Guess I'm just not used to this mild weather. It's always cold where I'm from so the beer is colder, too." It sounded lame even to him, but Kirk hoped that would serve as an explanation.

"Yeah, well wherever that is, you're not there now. If you can't take your beer, you'd best be going." Sharpe's tone made it abundantly clear that no-one in the pub wanted Kirk to be there anymore. It wasn't the first time Kirk had been in this situation and had no intention of leaving.

"Oh I can take this stuff. It's pretty weak, but I'm sure it'll do." Kirk smiled down at his drink, waiting for the reaction. He heard a thud from behind the bar and halted footsteps. He looked up to see that Sharpe had put an arm up to prevent the enraged landlord from getting any closer to Kirk.

Sharpe turned to face Kirk, arm still firmly in place "Weak? Who are you kidding, Yank? I've tried the piss you call beer. I'd feed it to a baby but they'd spit it out in disgust. Coloured water's all it is."

"Hah," Kirk smirked at the two. "They just gave you the visitors' stuff. You haven't tried the liquor we got. It'd curl your toes," Kirk looked up at Sharpe briefly, "and your hair."

Sharpe laughed and looked around to a man sitting at a table in the corner. Kirk hadn't noticed him when he came in, and got the impression that this was a man you didn't see unless he wanted you to. Sharpe looked back to him.

"You think I can't take my drink?"

One of the waitresses approached Sharpe, smiling and looked annoyed when she was waved away. Kirk couldn't help but smile at that. Sharpe seemed not to notice.

"You don't know me, do you, Kirk?" Sharpe seemed genuinely surprised. Kirk cursed his luck for finding the one bar with some sort of celebrity in it.

"Nope, not a thing," he answered honestly. "But how about I buy you a drink and you enlighten me?"

Sharpe released the landlord and nodded to him. "'nother pint, Mick. On the Captain here.

***********************************

McCoy was swearing loudly when he beamed back down to the planet. Chauvin had sustained only minor injuries from the mob attack, but he was going to inflict a lot more on Jim for not responding to his communicator. His tricorder indicated that Jim was in the building in front of him. There were five other life signs inside and he carefully checked the location of his phaser before he opened the door.

Jim's voice was the first thing he heard, and McCoy recognised the punchline of one of Jim's favourite stories.

"So I said 'Ma'am, if I'd known she was your sister, I'd have asked her to join us!'"

The landlord and the man opposite Jim burst into laughter. Jim did have an unnatural way of getting on with some people, McCoy thought wryly.

The landlord noticed McCoy and gestured to the man. Kirk turned to see who they were both staring at and spotted McCoy.

"Bones! Come here, have a drink. You gotta hear some of Major Sharpe's stories." Jim gestured to the dirty blond sitting opposite, who nodded at McCoy. "They're almost as good as mine!"

"Almost, eh?" Sharpe was smiling but McCoy had seen that smile before a lot of bar-fights and walked quickly to stand behind Kirk. A tall, dark-haired man appeared behind Sharpe at almost the same moment. Both Sharpe and Kirk appeared oblivious.

Sharpe continued "You were begging me to tell you mine earlier, and you've been trying to impress me since with your daft stories."

Sharpe smacked his glass down on the bar, and McCoy reached beneath his coat for his phaser. The man behind Sharpe caught his eye, gently shook his head and moved his hand slightly, allowing the poor light in the room to glint off the gun barrel.

"What can I say, I wanted to see if you could compare to me." Kirk shrugged. "I guess you're not bad, for a Major."

"Well if you're looking for comparisons," Sharpe stood up, and the man behind him tensed. McCoy moved his hand from his phaser to his communicator, trying to work out if he could call for transport before they all got killed. Kirk stood up as well, a little unsteadily and McCoy rolled his eyes, wondering just how much he'd had to drink this time.

"Get it out, then." Sharpe gestured to Kirk's crotch. "And we'll see who's the bigger man. I'll tell you this, though, you'll not win." Sharpe smiled confidently. McCoy heard Kirk laugh and could tell that whatever was about to come out of Kirk's mouth would probably get them all killed. Self-preservation kicked in; he hooked an arm around Kirk's shoulders and tried to guide him out the door.

"C'mon Jim, time to get back to the ship." In hindsight, McCoy thought, a slightly more respectful and less patronising tone might have worked better as Kirk shot him a filthy look.

"Ah you're a sailor." Sharpe sounded amused "Explains a lot. 'Specially the husband."

McCoy almost had Kirk to the door when Kirk span them both round

"Hah, yeah, well I'm not the one so desperate to see another man's dick." Kirk retorted, grinning.

"Jim-" McCoy tried to turn him around again and push him through the open door.

"Best be off, Jim. Dinner's probably getting cold" Sharpe was laughing as he said it.

"I'll be back!" Kirk shouted

"I'll be here." Sharpe replied.

**************************

"Who was that streak o' piss you were talking to?" Harper said, taking a seat next to Sharpe.

"Some sailor-boy nancy. Cocky sod; barely handles his beer. Why?"

"Oh no reason, no reason." Harper's tone was a warning and Sharpe turned to look at him. "Only Liz over there, " Harper gestured to a barmaid sitting at a table, pouting. "She was a little upset you were speaking sweet to him and not her."

"Give over!" Sharpe exclaimed.

"I know, I know, and I explained to Liz that you were just putting the Yank in his place, sharing war stories and all. But I'd be sure and go talk to Liz herself. Don't want her mouth running with something other than compliments, do we?"

Sharpe caught the warning look in Harper's eye. The message sank in as he downed his drink, clasping his Harper's shoulder as he got up. Sharpe made his way over towards the pouting barmaid with his barely audible "Later" leaving a brief grin on Harper's face.

**************************************

"I don't know why I bothered dragging you out of that bar," McCoy groused as they left the transporter room. "You've sure as hell left your head back there."

"Nah, not really," said Kirk, absently.

"You're distracted."

Kirk frowned slightly. "It's called alcohol, Bones. I'm still a little buzzed, okay? Sue me."

McCoy scoffed. "Unless that beer was spiked with something a lot harder, I don't think so. Jim, I haven't seen you this out of it since that blue beauty with the green hair turned your head."

Kirk thought back and grinned. "Yeah, she was something wasn't she?"

 

"Yeah, something that took a week of shots to get rid of afterwards," McCoy said, dryly.

Kirk turned to smile at McCoy and nudged him with his shoulder. "Good times, Bones."

They continued down the corridor in silence, Kirk recalling three great days and McCoy working out how to phrase his next question.

"So was it the blond this time?" McCoy asked.

 

"What, the waitress?" Kirk responded, confused.

"There was a waitress there?" McCoy asked, innocently.

Kirk seemed to take a minute before working out what McCoy was referring to. "Oh God, no! Bones, what are you talking about? Sharpe?"

McCoy shrugged. "Like I said, haven't seen you this out of it since Rigel Four."

Kirk's face was a picture. "C'mon, Bones. Seriously. It was nice to just drink and talk to another captain." Kirk thought for a second. "Even if he was a Major."

McCoy grumbled something under his breath, but decided to let it go.

"Hell of a war going on down there," Kirk said, after a long moment. The beer was starting to wear off, and he wasn't in the mood for kidding around anymore.

"Yeah," McCoy agreed "and it sounds like the local equivalent of Lieutenant Chauvin is the enemy. They mobbed him just for having a Creole accent. We had to cut things short and beam back before he got lynched. But this isn't the first time, Jim. There must be dozens of worlds we've visited with wars going on."

"Yeah, but this one..." Kirk trailed off, half lost in thought. Contemplative, but there was a tinge of something else there; something that McCoy couldn't quite place.

"Jim," Bones began to laugh nervously "Are you getting nostalgic over this? Because there are a bunch of-"

"No," Kirk interrupted and McCoy fell silent. "It just reminds me how different things used to be." Kirk shook his head as they entered the turbolift. "Right now, I could order that city destroyed. And I reckon Chekov would follow my orders without thinking. But it's a lot easier to obey orders when you don't have to see what happens. And it's a lot harder to lead men when they actually have to see the people they're trying to kill."

"Jim…" McCoy started, but Kirk wasn't listening.

"They're still fighting on battlefields, watching people die and knowing they killed them. Takes a hell of a man to lead men that way." Kirk shook his head, a little regretfully. "Some of the stories that Major Sharpe told me..."

McCoy cut him off with a warm hand on his shoulder. "You know Jim, I heard about this guy once. Stubborn son of a bitch, got a crew of professionals to completely ignore their mission, face what should have been certain death against an enemy that outnumbered and outgunned them. Left them orders, and they followed them to the letter while he beamed into an unknown hostile situation just to rescue his captain. Fought face to face with the enemy and took a real beating from what I hear. And then, after all he'd been through, he still tried to save that enemy's life."

Kirk gave Bones a look and Bones patted his shoulder reassuringly.

"People are people, Jim. They don't change all that much."

McCoy pressed the panel and the turbolift whirred into life. As they travelled towards the bridge, an idea struck him.

"You know, Chauvin was talking about sending down a team to investigate their history, see if we can't get some more insight into this conflict."

Kirk looked to McCoy, catching on as the doctor continued. "And who knows? Maybe we can find some way to help it get resolved." With his tongue firmly in his cheek, he added, "Without violating the Prime Directive, of course. Not that you'd ever go against regs."

"That's a great idea, Bones." Kirk smiled "Lets stick around and see if we can't learn something."


End file.
